Around the House,  Marriage Confessions

Home Sweet Home

We spent this past weekend unpacking more boxes.  And unpacking more boxes.  And unpacking even more boxes.

I should mention here that we had five different friends help us move out of the old house and into the new one and every single one of those people commented at one point or another that they didn’t understand how we had so much crap.  I would like to suggest that the reason for this is because I am married to the King of All Pack Rats.  Chris will not let me give away anything. No matter how useless it is or how long it sits in our garage.

Case and Point #1:  We have THREE dining room tables.  And each of those tables has SIX matching chairs.  I mean, seriously.  That is eighteen dining room chairs.  EIGHTEEN, CHRIS.  I am pretty positive that we could get rid of at least one of those sets and we would still be okay.

Case and Point #2:  We have THREE living room coffee tables.  We only have one living room.  And so the other two coffee tables have sat in various garages throughout our entire marriage serving no purpose whatsoever.

Case and Point #3:  We have at least SIX complete sets of matching luggage.  And each set has a minimum of three pieces, for a grand minimum total of 18 (that must be our magic number) pieces of luggage.  Not to mention the 8 or 9 individual duffel bags and miscellaneous carry-on bags we have acquired over the years.

So you see, Chris has a problem.  A serious problem.  And if I had it my way, I would call Goodwill and have them bring a big ol’ truck to load up all of our useless, duplicate crap.  But then Chris might divorce me.  So, I choose to stay married and just complain instead.  That seems to involve a lot less paperwork.

Anyway, we have finally gotten everything that we will actually be using into our house and we have piled up everything that we will not be using in our garage.  So, the house actually looks pretty clean and neat.  Though I would caution against opening any closet without the appropriate headgear.  This means that Chris let me take pictures of our house to show you guys!

What I love the most about this house is how open it is.  I know this kind of floor plan isn’t for everyone and if I didn’t have a small child I probably wouldn’t prefer it either.  But with Bean toddling around now and getting into everything, the openness of this house makes my life so much easier.  The kitchen, living room, and dining room are all basically one big room, which means I can just block off the one hallway leading to bedrooms and Bean is contained!  I can keep an eye on him no matter where I am in the house.

This is the view from the front door.  To the left that is a long hallway that has a full guest bath and three bedrooms off of it.  The master bed and bath is at the end of that hall.  Next to the hall is a wood-burning fireplace and then the sliding glass doors out to the back porch and pool.

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I really love this fireplace except that it is natural stone and Bean Man has already tripped over the hearth twice and scraped up his little knees.  But aside from that it is really pretty AND I get to keep my mantle decorations from Connecticut that I have for Christmas!  So, Bean’s just going to have to keep on tripping.  Take one for the team, Big Guy…

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This is the view from the hallway into the living room.  See how open it is?  I love that!  It’s so Florida!  I can actually keep the TV remote in the kitchen and flip around channels while I’m doing the dishes or cooking something.  It’s pretty much the greatest thing ever.

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And then this is the view from the sliding glass door into the living room.  See those two doorways on the right there?  The bedroom on the front of the house is our office and the next bedroom there is Bean Man’s room.  Those two rooms are just off of the living room and then the third bedroom (which we are using as a guest bedroom) and the master are further down that hallway I showed you before.

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One thing I am having to adjust to is that we are using our formal dining room table as our family kitchen table now since we don’t have a breakfast nook for our dinette.  When I see a wet ring under a glass on the table or something, I just try to remind myself that it’s just furniture.  But that’s taking some adjusting.  I put a tablecloth on it today and that helped a little bit with my nerves.  At least now I don’t gasp whenever someone sets a plate down.  The table actually sets six and then extends with a leaf out to seat ten, but we have stored the rest of our chairs and are just using four to save a little space.  We’ll pull out the others when we need them.

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I really love the openness of the kitchen.  It has tons of counter space – more than any house I’ve ever lived in – and that has been fantastic!  I have noticed though that the more space I have in the kitchen, the bigger the messes I make!  This has GREATLY annoyed Chris.  But I can’t help it.  I just keep reminding him of what a mess Ina Garten makes in HER kitchen on Barefoot Contessa and that perhaps I am simply channeling my inner South Hampton self.

He does not agree.

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So, that’s it.  That’s the new digs.  I’ll post pictures of each bedroom as we get to them.  And I’ll show you Bean’s bathroom (it’s the guest bath) that I finished this weekend later this week.  It’s pretty darn cute.

58 Comments

  • Layne

    LOVE the new house! It’s gorgeous! I think the floorplan is great too and your hardwoods are so pretty (and, from experience, SO much easier to keep clean!) And I love the built-ins that seem to be so common in this area for older homes. They are so pretty and convenient.

    And YAY! for an indoor laundry room. No more sweating while washing the clothes!! Looking forward to more pics! So glad you three are happy and settled!

  • Ashley

    LOVE the new house!! it’s beautiful — I too love how open it all is, that’s what my husbamd and I are looking for and I am SERIOUSLY jealous of your indoor laundry room…I swear I would do our laundry more if I didn’t have to go sweat outside doing it!

  • Jennifer

    Very pretty Kate. I love how open it is as well. But I’m a little confused (or maybe I can’t read). You have 6 bedrooms? Three plus the master down the hallway and two off the living room? I’m just curious because I would have thought you’d put Bean Man closer to you guys.

  • Life of a Doctor's Wife

    Looks fabulous! I love how open everything is! Your formal dining set is so pretty, too!!

    How did you choose which of the three sets to use? (That gave me a good giggle – the 18 dining room chairs. At least you will never run out of seating!)

  • Robin

    Love it! What a beautiful space! And did I see a laundry room to the right of the living room? Oh how I’m excited for you and jealous! Excited that you don’t have to go outside anymore to do laundry, and jealous because I still have to go down 2 flights of stairs from our bedroom to get to my laundry room out of the cold basement. 🙂 Seriously, though, very happy for you all.

  • Alaina

    Congrats on the new home! Should you go ahead and call TLC Hoarders for Chris with his furniture and luggage hoarding problem? It’d make a great episode…just sayin…

  • Darcy

    I *love* that huge window in your kitchen – it makes it so much more pleasant to do dishes when you get to stare outside at the same time.

    Heck, I love the whole house! I’m so glad you guys are finally in a spot where you can be comfortable and safe.

  • Meghan

    I was going to suggest the same thing as Jamie (#19)–I’m married to a former (and still sometimes) packrat, but what gets him motivated to get rid of stuff is the money he knows we can make off of it on craigslist/eBay. It is amazing how much money you find lying around in your house in stuff that you don’t need, don’t use, and just takes up space and has to be taken care of. Try telling Chris that part of what you guys make off selling the stuff he can blow on whatever he wants……that might provide some motivation. 🙂

  • Lindsey

    Beautiful home! I love the fireplace and the bookshelves, so pretty! I also really like that color green on the walls, we have a similar color but every time we take a picture of it, it turns up NEON green in the photo! Yuck! So happy for you guys!!!!!!

  • Tracy

    Love your new digs! Thanks for sharing. I’m totally impressed that you have pictures hung and everything. It makes me mildly irritated with myself since we moved a year and a half ago and still have finished furnishing our house. BUT we have remodeled every stinkin’ room in the house… so i’m trying to cut myself some slack. 🙂

  • Sarah H.

    I love it! Great job. That pat rack thing is very uncool of Chris. I am so sorry!! My husband and I both LOVE throwing away and donating many items during each move. You can come throw out our unneeded things the next time we move if you need to have that feeling fulfilled.

  • Mindee@ourfrontdoor

    So . . . Chris. There’s this television show I think you’d like. It’s called “Hoarders”. Perhaps you’ve heard of it?

    Also, two magic words: Craig’s List.

    signed,
    Married To Your Psychological Twin who I am slowly reforming.

  • Katherine

    Love the new place, it looks so cozy! I laughed re: the fireplace and Bean, because all family shots in our old home when we were kids show the brick fireplace in the background, with the bottom totally surrounded by huge pillows as guards! 😛

  • Kat @ LivingLikeTheKings

    First of – I LOVE the new house. LOVE the layout. I’m so super jealous. I wish the housing market in CT wasn’t so darn pricy. Secondly – I have an idea for mr. pack-rat (something that works with my husband). Offer up to put some items of craigslist and compromise that the $$ you make from craigslist would be used to buy something he “needs” like a DVD set or something else that’s useful/fun.

  • Sara @ embrylovescookies

    Regarding stone fireplaces and toddlers… they sell these sticky temporary bumper thingies that you peel and stick to the edges and corners of the fireplace. They aren’t terribly unattractive, and they save lots of tears from bumps and scrapes. Just google “fireplace bumper” and you’ll find them.

    P.S. Your house looks great so far! So happy for you and your family!!

  • laurenbtrain

    love the new crib! …see if chris will sell the stuff then with the $$ yall make you can buy something fancy, go on a mini vaca, a night on the town, etc…i thought my hubby was bad about saving stuff, but you made me feel WAY WAY WAY better!

  • alison

    Whoa!! fabulous place! love the built in bookshelves and the open kitchen! Sure wish mine was like that… maybe my husband would cook more if he could see the TV. Congrats!!

  • Nikki

    Katie, your house looks amazing! I am so happy how well everything is turning out for you guys! I cannot wait to see the rest of the house and the pool! It’s still reaching into the 90’s here in Texas which has me asking for a pool everyday!

  • Rebekah M.

    Idea for the hearth. (and while its not necessarily the most adorable thing ever, it works). a family that i babysat for covered their brick hearth in a thick quilt. really, they just folded it over so that it would cover all the rough places. i think they may have doubled the layers b/c it was very fluffy! granted it did not match the decor, they never had to worry about banged heads or scraped knees!

  • Kat

    Congrats on the new house! 🙂 You could send me some of that furniture. 🙂 My hubby and I moved in a year ago. We had an open house / we tied the knot party and had to borrow furniture to make the house look lived in. 🙂

  • Julie

    The house looks great. And since you already have the extra stuff in the garage, I think you should have a garage sale. Think of something really fantastic to use the proceeds on to soften the blow. Like whatever new flashlight watch spaceship thing Chris wants.

  • Heather

    Ooh, it’s gorgeous!
    One tip about the dining room table:
    My MIL puts a piece of plexi-glass down over her dining-room table, with a pretty fabric table runner under it. This way there is a pretty accent and the wood still shows nicely, but the wood is safe from little hands with markers that bleed through the paper, and hot dishes and rings from cool glasses.

    I think she always intended to put the plexi sheet away when her boys got older, but then she realized she had boys, and they will make messes wherever they go for the rest of their lives. And then one of them blessed her with grandchildren a decade earlier than she was expecting, so that was that 🙂

  • Megan @ Red Dirt and Crazy

    It is sooo nice!! And I know exactly what you mean about the openess! Our last house was that way and now we are in a 3 story townhouse and it…pretty much sucks!! I’m so ready to move outta here! Anywho…love your new house and I LOVE the color of the walls!! Congrats to you guys!! You will definitely bloom here!

    🙂

    Megan

    • Megan @ Red Dirt and Crazy

      Speaking of blooming…when you started the Bloom Where Your Planted Project did you think you would take it literally…like in the physical sense? I’m so excited for you guys! Your great parents and it’s a wonderful thing to see!

      I think the good Lord will probably have to take matters into his own hands with us and having another one. Pretty much like he had to do when we got pregnant with Q-Tip. lol… 🙂

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